Romance Beneath a Rodeo Moon

Rodeo Cohorts-Texaco and Brazille

The little red horse who’s registered name is Real “Someone offered owner Bob Scott $200,000 for him before the NCHA cutting futurity,” says Brazile. “Bob turned it down, and in the futurity, the horse ran off and refused to cut.” It turns out Texaco was afraid of calves.

Cool Dual, is a son of Dual Pep, so he started out life as a cutting horse.

After gelding the horse, Scott gave him to Trevor to train for calf roping.

“When I got him, he didn’t trust anybody,” Trevor says. “He would kick when you dismounted, he would kick when you tried to put boots on him and he was scared of cattle. When he saw a calf loaded in the chute, he’d break out into a sweat. He’s been the biggest challenge I’ve ever worked with.”

Getting the horse over his fear took a lot of patience, but Trevor knew the horse had a lot of potential. Eventually his patience and persistence paid off, and Brazile earned the horse’s trust. The two have been blazing a trail across the ProRodeo world ever since,

“He can score really well,” Trevor says. “And for being such a small horse – he’s only 13.3 hands – he can really fly. He’s always right on the calf. I call him Texaco, because he’s my own little oil well.”

There’s only one horse Trevor has ever roped a calf on without a bridle–Texaco. The pair accomplished the feat at the Fort Worth Stock Show’s AQHA tie-down roping class late in January 2010. The 7.8 second run beat every other roper there.

So what made Brazille do it? “Three-time Wrangler National Finals Rodeo tie-down roper Cade Swor said it wasn’t fair I was riding Texaco, unless I didn’t use a bridle. I told him to go get a good seat. It would have been nice if I’d had a warning and could have tried it once at home. But that’s not how it happened, so we just had to roll with it.”

The run beat everyone else, but there is an AQHA rule that states, “in all western classes, horses will be shown in a western saddle and appropriate bridle, snaffle bit or hackamore for the duration of the class.”

Unfortunately, the run was disqualified, but Texaco has become one of the best known calf horses ever. For a little guy, he’s left big horseshoes to fill.

Have you ever had a little horse with a big heart? What is the name of your favorite horse?